It was the best of customer service, it was the worst of customer service

I moved last week–just five miles down the road from Encino to Sherman Oaks (S.O. represent!). It seems like a short move like that should be a simple thing, and yet, somehow moving is pretty much the most freaking stressful thing in the world to me. Something about seeing all my worldly goods piled in cartons and figuring out what to keep and what to jettison. (“What about these doilies? I never use them for anything, but Aunt Dottie tatted them, and she’s dead now…”)

Having made two moves within LA (well, within the Valley) since I’ve been here, I can now safely conclude two things: 1. Time Warner will make the move worse, and 2. Delancey Street will make the move better. As I said, the move was relatively simple and Time Warner’s job was correspondingly so: on Friday, the day of the move, they were to transfer my Internet service from my old address to my new one. I was amazed when I was easily able to make an appointment for installation on the afternoon of the move. “Perhaps they’ve turned over a new leaf,” I thought, “Maybe they are actually doing their job competently.” Yeah. And maybe monkeys are flying out of my butt while I am typing this blog post. What actually happened after the jump, plus a pitch for Delancey Street.

So really what happened is that on the Wednesday prior to the move they cut off my Internet access. Of course, the woman in customer service with whom I spoke didn’t know this right off; she could only deduce it from the ten thousand checks we jointly performed. Such actions apparently occur in secret at Time Warner and are revealed only on a need-to-know basis. What’s more, such actions are irrevocable. Once the secret technician comes out and cuts off your access two days early that’s it, mister. No more Internets for you! And when they cancel your account and start a new one, rather than transfering your account as they promised, your old email address is no longer valid. It is true that the hook-up guy did come during his scheduled time and he hooked everything up fine. He did not, however, pick up my old modem, as they had told me he would. I had to take it in to the Time Warner office myself, a task I am familiar with as it happened last time I moved. Insert deep and heavy sigh here. (TW topped off the fabulous customer service with a sales call asking me if I wanted to bundle television or telephone with my Internet access. Oh yeah, sure.)

But it wasn’t all bad and I’m not just a whiner. The move itself–the actual transporting of my stuff from Encino to S.Oaks–was as smooth as it could be thanks to Delancey Street. The Delancey Street Foundation helps addicts, convicts, and homeless people build healthy and stable lives. It’s a residential program where people get off drugs, leave “the life,” get high school equivalency degrees, and learn job skills. To the latter end, they have a number of businesses, moving among them. This is the second time Delancey Street has moved me, and I can’t say enough good things about these guys. It’s like having the Marines move you–they are on a bloody mission. I was moving from a second-floor apartment and they literally sprinted up and down those stairs over and over again (and I have books like some dogs have fleas). They wrapped everything that needed wrapping. They placed all the furniture where I wanted it and even put up with my indecision about the bed. In short, they were awesome, and coming in at under $500, I’d say cheaper than most of the competition. If you need a mover, call them. And you know your money is going to a good cause.

Ditto on chezshoes’ comment. Make sure when you get your next bill from Time Warner the account you pay on is for the new place and that your balance for the old place is zero. They kept sending us 2 bills forever and just couldn’t seem to understand that we didn’t live at the old place anymore. All that after they told us they were “transferring” service. Oy vey, I feel a tension headache coming on just from thinking about it.

If it’s any consolation, AT&T did the exact same thing to me. Cut my services off early, didn’t transfer them over for TWO WEEKS, charged me a deposit for “new services,” tried to send me a new modem, and then, when it was finally connected, didn’t give me High Speed, which is what I was paying for.

Eventually it all got worked out and they gave me a free month to make up for it, only after I berated the manager for hours.

The worst has to the The Gas Company, they are a sole supplier and know it. I moved out of a rental on 7/30 and into a home. They started service at the new house, but would not turn off at the old. After the second bill, I called AGAIN and a very bothered rep. told me I had never called to turn it off so I was on the hook for the bill. Further, since I was calling after regular business hours, it would be 3 business days for the order to go into effect and where did I want my final bill sent? I asked if she showed that I had called to turn on the service at the new house and she replied that I had, but there was no order to turn it off at the other house. After I asked to speak to a manager, I was placed on hold for 10 minutes. When I finally got the manager I asked why I should have to pay a gas bill for a house I moved out of almost 2 months prior, she too, started the “you never called” routine and stopped in the middle to say, “oh I see here you did call, twice, we’ll turn off the service and take the charges off your bill.”